The Greatest Stoic Argued That Kindness Is More Manly Than Anger
What the philosopher Marcus Aurelius believed about masculinity
Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Just be one!
— Meditations, 10.16
Over the past few decades, there’s been a resurgence of interest in Stoicism. People often confuse stoicism (lower-case), a coping style that involves suppressing or concealing emotions, also called having a “stiff upper-lip,” with Stoicism (capitalized), the ancient Graeco-Roman school of philosophy. Some crudely equate “manliness” with being tough and unemotional (lower-case “stoicism”). I think there’s a more nuanced way to understand how Stoic philosophy might inform a modern man’s conception of his role in society.
The most famous ancient Stoic is Marcus Aurelius, who was emperor of Rome during the height of its power. (I wrote about his use of Stoicism in my book How to Think Like a Roman Emperor: The Stoic Philosophy of Marcus Aurelius.) Marcus was the closest thing the world has ever witnessed to Plato’s ancient ideal of the philosopher-king. Indeed, we’re told that he frequently quoted Plato: “that those states prospered where the philosophers were kings or the kings philosophers.”
